Officer arrested, fired from department

Published: Thursday, May 9, 2013 at 09:16 AM.

PANAMA CITY BEACH — Police have located at least two other possible victims of an auxiliary reserve officer arrested Wednesday night.

Justin Keith Jenkins, 20, of Panama City Beach, was arrested and charged with two felonies and two misdemeanors for allegedly sending sexually explicit messages, including video chats in which he allegedly masturbated, to a pre-teen girl from Panama City Beach.

Jenkins was fired from the Panama City Beach Police Department’s auxiliary reserve program, which employs people with police training on a part-time basis, as a result of the investigation.

Police continue to investigate Jenkins. Investigators obtained and served a search warrant for Jenkins’ computer and phone, and investigators now believe they have identified two more possible victims, Chief Drew Whitman said Thursday afternoon.

One of the victims is a local resident and the other lives in Alabama; all of the victims knew each other, Whitman said. The News Herald does not identify victims of sexual crimes.

“He was preying on girls through Facebook,” Whitman said.

Police began an investigation into Jenkins Wednesday after the victim’s mother told investigators Jenkins’ might have been sending explicit messages to minors via text message, video chat and social networks.

PANAMA CITY BEACH — Police have located at least two other possible victims of an auxiliary reserve officer arrested Wednesday night.

Justin Keith Jenkins, 20, of Panama City Beach, was arrested and charged with two felonies and two misdemeanors for allegedly sending sexually explicit messages, including video chats in which he allegedly masturbated, to a pre-teen girl from Panama City Beach.

Jenkins was fired from the Panama City Beach Police Department’s auxiliary reserve program, which employs people with police training on a part-time basis, as a result of the investigation.

Police continue to investigate Jenkins. Investigators obtained and served a search warrant for Jenkins’ computer and phone, and investigators now believe they have identified two more possible victims, Chief Drew Whitman said Thursday afternoon.

One of the victims is a local resident and the other lives in Alabama; all of the victims knew each other, Whitman said. The News Herald does not identify victims of sexual crimes.

“He was preying on girls through Facebook,” Whitman said.

Police began an investigation into Jenkins Wednesday after the victim’s mother told investigators Jenkins’ might have been sending explicit messages to minors via text message, video chat and social networks.

According to a criminal complaint:

Jenkins told investigators that between July and November 2012, he established a relationship with the victim, who he knew to be 12 years old at the time. During that period, he sent her photos of his genitals and masturbated on several occasions during video chats and suggestive text.

He was booked into the Bay County Jail Wednesday night on charges of lewd and lascivious conduct, lewd and lascivious exhibition, distributing harmful material to a minor and contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

He got a pretrial release during a bond hearing Thursday, according to jail staff.

The lewd and lascivious charges are second-degree felonies punishable by up to 15-year prison sentences.

An earlier version of this story is posted below:

The Panama City Beach Police Department arrested one of its auxiliary officers and charged him with several counts of lewd and lascivious conduct.

Investigators wrote in a news release that Justin Keith Jenkins, 20, of Panama City Beach sent explicit messages and photos of himself to a 13-year-old girl via text messaging, social media instant messaging and online live video chats. Beach police began the investigation into Jenkins after they received a complaint, the news release states. According to an arrest affidavit Jenkins confessed to the behavoir which took place between July and November of last year when the girl was 12.

Jenkins joined the department as an auxiliary officers in December of last year but as a result of this investigation he has been terminated from the reserve program, officials wrote in a news release.